I’m proud to say that the first draft of Video Rage, the sequel to Reborn City, is finally finished! And it took exactly six months to write. I’m not kidding, I started it on July 5th, 2013 and finished it today on January 5th, 2014. Crazy coincidence, huh?

Writing the last three chapters of VR were at times difficult but all the time extremely fun. I just felt the story flowing out, even when I made changes to how the scene played out in my head to how it played out on paper at the very second I was writing the story. And a whole lot happened in those last three chapters: the final conflict of the novel was resolved and I was able to set up for the third and final book of the trilogy (more to come on that later in the post). I’m actually very satisfied with how this novel turned out. I started it with the goal of making a kick-ass story where the characters didn’t lose their depth and weren’t reduced to one-dimensional cut-outs like Katniss Everdeen in Catching Fire. Although I may be biased against my own novel, I believe I did a very good job. Most of the characters grew in their own ways, and some had pretty exciting and at times tragic twists happen to them. I think anyone who reads this novel will be satisfied with it (God-willing).

And now for the page and word counts (and by page, I mean 8.5″ by 11″ MS Word paper pages). In my last post about my progress with Video Rage, the page count was 197 pages and the word count was 54,703 words as of Chapter 24. With the addition of Chapters 25-37 (the last chapter being called “Epilogue” actually, but whatever), the page count is 299 pages and the word count is 83,935 words! That’s a pretty decent-sized novel, around the size of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone actually. Of course the editing phase may either trim it down or expand it a little, depending on how I go about editing each and every chapter and what I do in those chapters.

So now that I’ve finished this monumental task, what are my plans? For now I’ll make sure to back up VR and other important documents so that I don’t lose them. Then I’ll only write for homework and for scholarship for a little while. After that period though I’ll work on several short stories and after I’ve done enough of those, I’ll get back to work on Laura Horn and finish that up as well. And as the final draft of Snake comes together, I’ll work on that too and get it ready for whenever it’ll be published. And when it’s time, I’ll start going over VR and editing it as well. Perhaps within a year or two it’ll be available as well.

And as for the third and final book of the series, I won’t write that any time soon. I need some time to work on other books and other projects so that I can return to the world of the West Reborn Hydras with fresh eyes and ready to finish their story. I also need time to figure out how the story will end. I know what my final scenes are probably going to look like, and I know who the main antagonist will be and how he’s going to be a pain in the ass for the Hydras, but I haven’t settled on anything yet. When the time comes though, I’ll let you know. And hopefully by then the Hydras will have a bigger fan base than just my sister, my stepmother, and a few good friends of mine. That would definitely be nice.

For now though, I’ve got files to back up and a dinner to cook before the new semester starts tomorrow. Wish me luck, my Followers of Fear.